NEW DELHI: The Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council is close to bringing a few petroleum products, including natural gas and Aviation Turbine Fuel (ATF), under the ambit of the indirect tax regime. On Friday, the council’s joint secretary Dheeraj Rastogi said the next meeting would see deliberations on applying GST on natural gas on an experimental basis.
Several petroleum products like kerosene, naphtha and LPG are already under the ambit of the GST. However, five items in the basket, namely crude oil, natural gas, ATF, diesel and petrol, have been excluded for the initial years.
While there is intense opposition from states over proposals to bring common fuels like petrol and diesel under GST, Rastogi said that natural gas could be a good candidate for a trial.
“Petroleum is a considerably larger source of revenue, not only for the Centre but for states too. On the natural gas front, there is some consensus for bringing it into the GST ambit and therefore, it could be the first petroleum product that could come within the GST network,” Rastogi said at a workshop on GST organised by the PHD Chamber of Commerce.
Rastogi added that ATF could also be brought within the GST ambit, but didn’t give any time-frame for the move. Industry representatives from the aviation sector have already made representations to the government on bringing ATF costs down, after crude oil prices surged last month.
A policy decision is also likely on setting up centralised advance ruling authorities instead of keeping redressal of relevant issues confined to one particular state authority.